


Scandalous

by Neery



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Class Issues, Internalized Homophobia, Multi, Shame, Threesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-08-14
Packaged: 2018-12-15 07:06:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11800953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neery/pseuds/Neery
Summary: The first time James shared a bed with both Thomas and Miranda.





	Scandalous

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by [Fangirlishness](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Fangirlishness/pseuds/Fangirlishness)

"Thomas, you won't believe this, they've cancelled the whole—" Miranda's voice trailed off. The door she had carelessly thrown open knocked into the wall, unheeded.

James froze, caught like a rabbit beneath the eyes of a hawk. Only his heart still pounded in his chest. 

"I didn't realize you were entertaining the lieutenant tonight, Thomas," Miranda said delicately. "I'll be in the green salon—no need to hurry on my behalf." On those last words her voice tilted into a knowing slyness that brought a new wave of heat to James's already burning face. 

James felt the mattress move as Thomas stood, saw him reaching for her from the corner of his eyes. "Miranda—maybe you'd like to stay?" 

Thomas turned back towards the bed, setting his hand on James's shoulder. "What do you think, James? Would you like that?"

 _Merciful God_. Thomas said it easily, gently, the way he always said such things, as if there were nothing to them. He'd suggest some shocking, filthy thing like a man passing the pudding at dinner— _"Would you like that, James?"_

They'd talked about this, a little, or Thomas had, James half-dozing in his lap while Thomas ran his fingers through James's hair. _"Would you like for Miranda to join us?"_

The notion had made James blush violently even then, for all that he'd shared their beds—their separate beds!—for weeks now. The thought of letting Miranda see what Thomas did to him, what he could so easily reduce James to… 

And yet the idea had heated his blood as much as it had shamed him. They'd gone a whole second round on the strength of the images it had put in James's head. 

He hadn't said no. He'd even let himself imagine going through with it. Maybe they'd let him see a little of what the two of them did when they were alone together, he'd thought, feeling a strange tight yearning in his chest. Maybe he could stroke Thomas off while she watched, although even the thought of doing that much with her eyes on him had made him blush all over again. 

Now Miranda was seeing rather more than that. 

James pressed his overheated face into the cool sheets, knowing full well the image he must present: face-down, naked, his arms tied to the bedposts with her husband's cravats. The position did not exactly show him to advantage, he knew. He could imagine all too easily what she must be seeing: the fine fabric framing his rough, uncouth workman's hands; the scars on his back; her husband's seed still trickling down the inside of his thighs. 

Thomas had been eager tonight. He hadn't bothered to undress before tearing James's clothes off and pressing him down to the bed. He'd never even undone more than the placket of his breeches. Now that he'd tucked himself away he was the image of a proper lord again, in his waistcoat and stockings; only his hair a little dishevelled. 

What a contrast they must make. A peer of the realm and the bit of rough he might as well have picked up down by the docks. 

"James?" Thomas asked again, concern rising in his voice. In a moment he was going to gently usher Miranda out of the room. He'd give James an easy way out, as he always did when he noticed he'd shocked James's sensibilities.

"Stay, if you like," James choked out, giving in to the urge to hide his face in the pillow again. He didn't think he could bear to meet Miranda's eyes. 

"Yes?" Miranda asked, sly delight in her voice. He heard her kicking off her shoes as she stepped towards the bed. The mattress dipped where she knelt on it. 

James could feel her looking at him. The back of his neck felt feverish. 

Miranda put her hand in the middle of his naked, sweat-slicked back. James shuddered all over. She stroked her hand up his spine and ran her fingers through his hair, which had mostly come loose from its queue. 

"My, what a mess he's made of you, lieutenant." Her voice was sly, amused. 

James pressed his face into the pillow and forced himself to keep breathing. She didn't mean it maliciously, he knew. She'd always liked to make him blush. She didn't know what it did to him, being seen like this. 

He couldn't help but feel that Thomas would dislike the heated mess his thoughts had become. _Shame is only a tool used to control us_ , Thomas had told him once. 

Maybe it really was that easy for him. Maybe he didn't see anything shameful in this, his wife seeing the wreck he'd made of James. 

Miranda tugged the ribbon from James's hair, pulling the tangled strands apart until it curled loosely about his neck. The touch eased a part of the unbearable tension in him. His lovers had always liked his hair. He liked to think that it somewhat made up for the rough, unlovely lines of his face. 

The mattress dipped again, Thomas sitting down beside his shoulders. He ran his soft, gentle fingers up James's arm and rubbed his hand, fitting the tip of his fingers beneath the ties. "Are you still comfortable?"

Miranda's hand was a brand on the back of his neck. His cock throbbed and ached. He thought he'd die before he'd let himself rut against the mattress with Miranda's eyes on him, and yet it was all he could do to still his hips. He rather thought that his hands might mortify and fall off before he'd so much as notice. But Thomas had asked, and as always when Thomas asked him a question, it made him want to put some thought towards the answer. 

James flexed his fingers. There was a tingle in his hands, a dull ache starting in his shoulders. Nothing to signify. If Thomas untied him, like as not they'd make him turn to his back, make him meet their eyes. 

"I'm perfectly comfortable," he said. 

Miranda ran her hand down his back, chasing a shiver down his spine. And then she touched the inside of his thigh, where his skin was slick with oil and semen, evidence of everything he'd let Thomas do to him tonight. 

James startled, his thighs trying to flinch shut without any conscious decision. Humiliation squeezed his chest, suffocating, even as his cock jerked and throbbed. Bad enough that he liked it so much; worse to be _seen_ liking it; almost unbearable to be seen so by Miranda, brilliant sharp-eyed Miranda with her knowing smiles and her razor wit. Miranda, whose good opinion he wanted more than any other woman's in the world. 

Miranda's hand stilled, then jerked away. "James?" 

Her voice was quiet, gentle, the voice one would use to avoid spooking a shy animal. James viciously resented the coddling in it, even as his heart clenched at the care. 

Thomas stroked a strand of hair back from James's face, trying to catch his eyes. "You'd speak up if you didn't like something—if you were uncomfortable?" 

_God_. Of course Thomas was going to make him _say_ it. James took a deep breath. "I. I like—" 

Words failed him. James gritted his teeth. _No shame_ , he told himself, wielding the words like a whip. But Thomas, wonderful clever Thomas, was already relenting. 

"All right," he said, low. He bent down to press a kiss to James's shoulder, making him shiver. 

"You like this, then?" Miranda ran her hand up his thigh again, trailing her fingers over his slick skin. James managed a single, convulsive nod, only hoping she wouldn't make him say it aloud.

Miranda touched the swollen, sensitive skin of his hole. James finally lost his grip on his self control. His hips hitched against the mattress, pressing his cock against the Hamiltons' fine linen sheets. Pleasure sparked through him like lightning, obliterating. He couldn't hold back the groan that broke from his throat. 

Miranda made a low, humming sound. She slipped the tip of one finger inside him, feeling how wet he was, how open still. " _Such_ a mess," she said again. Her voice was low, mischievous, rough with what he hoped was arousal.

James breathed, and kept breathing. Thomas's hand was on his shoulder, a steady, comforting weight. His cock ached. Every little movement of his hips sent a bolt of pleasure up his spine. 

Miranda pressed her finger in deeper. A gasping moan escaped him. 

It wasn't even the first time she'd had a finger inside him. She liked to touch him that way while he was fucking her, sometimes. It had made him blush then, too, but it had seemed… if not safe, then safe enough. Seamen talked (and talked, and talked) when it came to their exploits with women. Plenty of men liked a finger up their arse, he knew, and hardly any of them were sodomites. 

There was nothing safe about this now, Miranda touching him with the evidence of her husband's pleasure still inside him. And yet the feeling of it spiked through him like a knife, pleasure so intense it was almost pain.

"Are you sore, James?" Miranda asked, twisting her finger, pressing against him until he writhed under her touch, his breath coming in harsh pants. "Will you let Thomas have you again?"

"Yes," he managed to say, through a throat that still felt closed up tight. 

Thomas's hand went bruisingly tight on his shoulder for a moment, and then he hurriedly skinned out of his clothes and fumbled for the bottle on the bedside table, slicking himself again, not that it was much needed by this point. 

"How would you like us, dear?" Thomas asked, still _talking_ about it, dear God. Thomas fucking Hamilton, who'd never let shame touch him a day in this life. What must it be like, to be that easy inside your own skin? 

The thought tasted bitter; James didn't even know whether it was envy or resentment burning him up inside. 

"Keep him tied up a little while longer, will you? It's such a pretty picture." He could hear the smile in Miranda's voice. "You won't mind, Lieutenant?" she asked, a teasing edge to her voice but not a trace of any unkind mockery, even as James winced from her words; as if he'd been _pretty_ a day in his life. 

He didn't say anything, didn't want to know what'd be in his voice if he tried; only spread his legs a little more and kept his face down in the pillow. And then Thomas was there, kneeling between his thighs, nudging his legs open just that little bit farther. It left James spread out like a cheap whore, all the goods on display. But at least there was no more fucking talking. 

Thomas brushed James's hair off his neck and bent down to kiss him there, soft and open-mouthed, his lips trailing down the knobs of James's spine. James's breath caught in his throat. Thomas was always gentle with him, generous with his hands and his mouth. He didn't quite know why he'd expected him to be any other way now, and yet he suddenly had to know—he twisted his head around, seeking. 

Thomas's lips found his immediately, no hesitation. James almost laughed. Of course Thomas wouldn't just fuck his lover in front of his wife but would kiss him, too; and not the dry, careful brush of lips Miranda had seen them share before but a proper filthy kiss, James's tongue fucking into his mouth and Thomas sighing happily, biting his lip. 

James had fucked other men before, hurried furtive encounters that left him feeling soiled down to his bones. He'd never kissed a single one of them. 

Thomas kissed like he breathed. Thomas would stroke his face and suck his cock and curl up to sleep in his arms as if all of it was one to him, as if there was no shame in any of it. It seemed he couldn't muster the sense to be ashamed even now, with Miranda seeing all of it. James's heart was a bird in his chest, a small and frightened thing beating wildly against the bars of its cage.

"All right?" Thomas asked, sliding the slick head of his cock over James's hole, the tip pressing just barely inside. 

James nodded wordlessly, the smallest jerk of his head. Thomas pushed in slowly, working himself in inch by inch. It dragged a sound out of James, a desperate filthy moan that made his face burn anew. 

He was sensitive still, a little sore after all, but that only made it better. He'd been close before Thomas had even put it in, his cock a heated, throbbing ache between his legs. He clenched his hands in their ties and blew out a hard, shuddering breath, every muscle going tense. 

"Wait," he said. Thomas stilled upon him. He felt like he might spend without giving Thomas time for so much as a single thrust. Even with Thomas carefully holding himself motionless it seemed to take him an age to ease himself off the edge. 

"James?" Miranda asked, her voice concerned. 

It was Thomas who answered her, beautiful Thomas, as if he knew James couldn't have spoken just then to save his life. "He's quite all right. Only give him a moment, dear," he said, a faint thread of amusement in his voice. 

He'd teased James before, about how the smallest thing could bring him to the edge sometimes. James tolerated it silently. He didn't think he could explain it to Thomas, why it got to him like that. What it meant, sharing a bed like this, with a man he l—a man he liked and respected, and who respected him back; being able to touch and kiss and to stretch out on soft clean sheets together. 

Thomas had had other lovers before, he knew, college friends, fellow peers of the realm, men with the luxury of private rooms and discreet servants. Thomas had never in his life fucked a man he could barely stand to look at in a filthy alley, knowing that if they were discovered both of them might hang for it. 

James pushed the thought away. None of that belonged here, in this bed, or anywhere near these two people. 

The memories had taken the edge off, at least. "Move," he told Thomas, pushing back against him, biting down on a groan. 

Thomas was thick and hot inside him. For a few moments there wasn't a single thing in the world beside the animal pleasure of being fucked just right. And then Miranda's hand was on him again, sliding between them, her finger touching the base of Thomas's cock, touching James where he was stretched wide around him. 

"Oh God," James said, "Fuck," muffling his voice in the pillow. The pleasure of it lit him up like a flare, dazzling, almost too much to bear. 

He didn't protest when Thomas pulled him up onto his knees, even though it was just about the least dignified position imaginable, with his chest still flat on the sheets. It changed the angle enough to leave him gasping with every thrust. 

Miranda ran her hand up the inside of his thigh, brushing the base of his cock. "Would you like a hand, James?" she asked. 

James twisted away almost on instinct. With Thomas fucking him hard and steady, it would've been too much. He was so close already. 

"Don't need it," he managed, although saying it out loud brought a new wave of heat to his face. But what point would there be in hiding now? She'd already seen the worst of it. Let her see just how much he liked it; let her see Thomas make him come, untouched. 

Miranda gave a low, pleased hum. "That's a neat trick. I can't do that at all," she said, which he supposed he'd known. She always wanted his hand on her when they were fucking, or his mouth, after. Except it'd never occurred to him to think of it like that, as if it were the same, as if they were just two people who could compare notes on how they liked to get fucked. As if there were no difference in a wife enjoying herself in the marriage bed, or even lying with her lover, and—and _this_ , this perversion of all natural instincts. 

And yet suddenly the distinction seemed meaningless. Was it really such a perversion, what Thomas did to him? 

He opened his eyes. Miranda was lying next to him, watching him. She had her skirts rucked up, her hand between her legs, her breath hitching with every movement. Her eyes were dark with lust; no judgment in her gaze, no contempt. 

He held her eyes, not looking away, not even when Thomas started thrusting quick and hard and the world blurred with the pleasure of it. James twisted his hand in the hopeless tangle he'd made of Thomas's cravat and yanked until the knot came free. He reached for her free hand with his. Miranda tangled their fingers together, squeezing hard. 

"James—" Thomas said, breathless, his hands tightening on James's hips. He gave a few more hard, grinding thrusts, his rhythm turning erratic. James felt him spill, seed dripping wetly down the inside of his thighs. That was what did it: that feeling, and the filthy wet sounds of Thomas's last few thrusts, and the perfect pressure inside him. James came with his hand still holding Miranda's, his eyes squeezing shut against the blinding pleasure of it. 

He lay face-down for a languorous minute, contentment and an enormous feeling of physical well-being rolling over him like a gentle surf. Thomas stirred atop him just as James started becoming aware that Miranda's hand was still tight around his, and that she was breathing in little hitching gasps in rhythm with the slick sounds of her touching herself. 

Thomas pulled out quickly—James couldn't quite contain a wince—and reached for her. "Miranda? Would you like—"

"Help me out of this dress," Miranda said, sitting up in a tangle of skirts. 

James rolled to his side, his bound arm stretched out awkwardly behind him, to watch as Thomas fumbled with Miranda's stays. She yanked the dress over her head impatiently with the laces only half undone and toppled Thomas onto his back. It startled a laugh out of him that turned into a moan when she knelt astride his chest. 

James watched, wide-eyed, as Thomas wrapped his hands around her hips and pulled her up until he could bury his head between her thighs. James was too well-fucked for much of a physical response, but Miranda's shuddering moan, the wet sound of Thomas licking her, made his oversensitive cock throb painfully between his legs. 

Miranda tangled one hand in Thomas's short blond hair, gripping him tight, and reached for James again with the other. She threw her head back and squeezed his hand hard enough to hurt as Thomas brought her off. Her naked body was sheened with sweat, her nipples drawn up into tight peaks, breasts heaving with every breath she drew. God, she was beautiful. James had never wanted a woman the way he wanted her. He wanted to touch her, he wanted to drag her down on top of him and learn how to get her to make those sounds Thomas was drawing from her with every touch. 

He would get the chance, he thought, he hoped; surely they'd do this again, if Thomas and Miranda had liked it even a fraction as much as he had? 

Miranda's noises changed, the familiar little catch in her breath that James had learned to recognize. He watched as her body drew into a tight bow, as she came with a loud, abandoned groan. 

James dragged her down against his side as she went limp. She let herself fall heavily against him, his arm around her.

For a while they just lay there, the three of them side by side, breathing hard. Finally Thomas picked himself up with a sigh and came over to James's side of the bed to untie him. It took him a while; the knot had pulled tight. James stayed where he was, sprawled facedown with Miranda at his side. He did not in the least feel like moving. Thomas could deal with the result of his messy knots himself. 

Thomas made an unhappy sound over the red weal left behind when the fabric finally came loose. James reclaimed his hand with a snort before he could tut over it any more. "It's fine, Thomas."

Thomas leaned over to peer at the remains of the cravat James had yanked loose himself. It hung from the bedpost in a sad tangle. 

"I really thought that was going to hold."

"If the youngest cabin boy on the ship tied a knot that sloppy, I'd have him up for discipline," James said drily. He picked up Thomas's hand, his soft, long-fingered gentleman's hand which had never done a day of manual labour, and dropped an affectionate kiss on the back of it. 

"You'll have to teach me to do it right, then," Thomas said. 

"Maybe I'll demonstrate on you." James was a little taken aback by how easy it was to say the words. It'd always felt easier, felt safer to let Thomas have the lead in what they did. And yet suddenly he thought he'd quite like to have Thomas like this, tied down and at his mercy.

"You'll have to let me watch," Miranda said. "He makes the most amazing sounds when you just tease him a little and don't let him move, you know. You'd think you were torturing him."

"Does he, now?" James said, trying not to let his voice show how that image gripped him right by the balls. 

Thomas arched an eyebrow. "I can see I'm going to rue the day I introduced you two. Will you conspire against me at every turn now?" But although James couldn't help watching him a little anxiously, he didn't sound displeased at all. 

They lay quiet for a while, half-dozing. Thomas was sprawled half over James's back, his head pillowed on James's shoulder. Occasionally he'd turn his head and press a soft, open-mouthed kiss to James's neck or the cut of his shoulder blade. 

As usual, it was also Thomas who stirred first. James grumbled a little when he felt him shifting about. He loved Thomas's boundless energy, but by God, was it too much to ask for an hour's rest after this much vigorous exercise? 

"Miranda, you were going to tell me about Lady Weaverthorpe's dinner party when you came in," Thomas said. "Why on Earth did they cancel at the last minute, after they'd made such a fuss about it?" 

"Oh! You're going to like this." Miranda wriggled her shoulders a little deeper into the bed, a smirk on her face, the very picture of a shark scenting blood in the water. She didn't gossip much, but when she did have a juicy story to share, she loved it so. "The ladies Thornton and Ainsley agreed it must be the most scandalous thing to happen in all of London today."

James laughed. Thomas was a warm, comfortable weight on him, Thomas's soft cock snugged up against his thigh. Miranda, on his other side, was naked as the day she was born, gloriously unselfconscious. When James turned his head to look at her she slid her fingers between his legs again, playing with him a little, idly. 

"Shows what they know," James said. What _would_ the ladies say, if they had any idea what sort of scandalous behavior truly went on in London, right beneath their noses?

Miranda twisted her hand, one finger pressing slickly against his hole. James's cock, which a minute ago he'd have considered entirely finished for the day, gave what was probably an overly optimistic twitch. James shifted a little to accommodate the sensitive pressure of it under his body and let his thighs fall open for Miranda's hand. He returned her sly smirk with a smile of his own. 

Hell, who cared what they thought? Who cared what _anyone_ thought? Fuck them all. The three of them knew better. 

Wasn't that all that mattered?

 

THE END

**Author's Note:**

> Come cry about pirates with me [on tumblr](http://cassandrexx.tumblr.com/)!
> 
> I haven't had any luck finding a Britpicker or someone to check the period language for me. If you noticed any issues in this story, or are interested in helping me out with this or any future stories, please let me know!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [丑闻](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12262653) by [IreneSheng](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IreneSheng/pseuds/IreneSheng)




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